Recognizing Emotional And Psychological Triggers: Why Counseling Is Vital To Drug Detox
If you are planning on entering a drug rehabilitation program, and this is your first time, you should know that there are some additional steps beyond the "drying out" phase. Many people assume that a drug rehab program means that they enter the program for a few days to a week, get past the hard part of not having access to the drug or using it, and then they are cured. That is a very misleading notion, because you also need counseling services to help keep you off of the drug of choice. Here is why counseling is vital to the drug detox process and how it teaches you to recognize your emotional and psychological triggers.
You May Not Know What Your Triggers Are
Most people who check in to a rehab program do not know how they got hooked on their drug of choice. Typically they believe that they just tried it, liked it and kept repeating the experience. While that may be true, there are often underlying triggers that caused you to become an addict. If you do not know what these triggers are, then you do not know how to recognize them in action or stop them from effecting an illicit drug use in you. The counseling portion of detox takes you at your most vulnerable, right after you have come out of detox room where you have been for the first few days, and starts getting you to explore what your triggers are.
Recognizing and Accepting Your Triggers
Some triggers are emotional (i.e., you get really depressed or extremely hostile). Other triggers are psychological (e.g., you were sexually assaulted and someone touching you causes you to turn to drugs to escape that sensation or escape your physical self). When you can finally recognize your triggers, write them down. Accept them as part of yourself and know that it will take some effort to avoid situations that trigger you, or heal enough so that triggers lose their hold over you. Denying that your triggers exist may only cause you to start using again because you cannot stop what you do not recognize or accept. It is hard, but that is why the counseling part of detox is so important.
Learning to Deal with Your Triggers
Some of the ways in which you deal with your triggers may require a lot more counseling and/or cognitive behavioral therapy. Other ways to deal with triggers involve ignoring the trigger (if possible) and/or exposure therapy, which means that you get up close and personal with the thing or person that sets you off and then you do not move from that spot and you do not use drugs to escape it. While you are in rehab and detox, your therapist will show you exactly how to deal with each of your triggers, as well as how to deal with them in a much healthier fashion. Contact a business such as Evergreen Recovery Centers for more information on drug rehabilitation.
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